Newsletter 31

The
Jordanian media has come under heavy scrutiny by the country's highest
authority, King Abdullah, because of their recent coverage of
government economic and cultural policies. MENASSAT's Amman
correspondent has been following the events and gives us this report on
the battle between Jordan's journalists and the government.

Maher
Sabry's Toul Omry (All My Life) is probably the most daring film about
homosexual life in Egypt ever made. MENASSAT spoke with the director
following the premiere of his film at a festival in San Francisco.

Despite
a media blackout in Syria, human rights sources confirmed to MENASSAT
on Monday that there have been possibly dozens of deaths and injuries
in confrontations between political detainees and prison officials at
Sednaya military prison near Damascus.

During
the 20-year rule of former Mauritanian president Mu’awiya Sayyidi Ahmad
Taya, artists and writers lived under a constant fear of censorship and
suppression. Among those artists who have emerged from years of living
in the shadows is the only cartoonist in Mauritania, Bon Ould Al-Dif.

A
Chinese computer program is helping web surfers in Yemen break through
government control of the Internet. It is part of a bigger trend by
journalists and activists who are beginning to challenge Internet
censorship in Yemen.

Egyptian
author Nawal Al-Saadawi has always had a bumpy relationship with her
country's censors. Recently, her own publisher stopped printing two of
her books because they were deemed blasphemous by some. MENASSAT's
Cairo correspondent has this in-depth look at Al-Saadawi's story.

Award-winning
Palestinian journalist Mohammed Omer was hospitalized last week after
he was stopped by Israeli security agents at the Allenby Bridge border
crossing with Jordan. Omer was returning to Gaza from accepting the
2008 Martha Gellhorn award in London. He spoke to MENASSAT's Ola
al-Madhoun from his hospital bed in the Gaza Strip.